President Trump on Tuesday rejected the idea that the US military should “police” African countries like Somalia and Kenya, comments that come as he is overseeing the heaviest US air campaign in Somalia in history.
“We’ve brought back the fundamental principle that defending the homeland is the military’s first and most important priority,” Trump told a group of hundreds and generals at the US Marines Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia, who were assembled by US War Secretary Pete Hegseth.
“Only in recent decades did politicians somehow come to believe that our job is to police the far-reaches of Kenya and Somalia, while America is under invasion,” the president added.
Also on Wednesday, US Africa Command announced it launched an airstrike in Somalia’s northeastern Puntland region that it said targeted the local ISIS affiliate. The bombing brings the total number of US airstrikes in Somalia so far this year to 80, as the administration has shattered the record for annual airstrikes in the country, which Trump set at 63 during his first term in 2019.
For context, President Biden launched a total of 51 strikes in Somalia throughout his entire four-year term, according to numbers from New America, an organization that tracks the US air war. President Obama launched 48 strikes in Somalia throughout his eight years in office, and George W. Bush launched 12. During his first term, Trump launched 219 strikes in the country.
The US war in Somalia receives virtually no media coverage in the US despite the constant US airstrikes. AFRICOM has been bombing both the ISIS affiliate in Puntland, where it backs local forces, and al-Shabaab in central and southern Somalia.
After Trump returned to office this year, he eased restrictions on airstrikes and ground raids, giving lower-level commanders greater freedom of action in areas outside of official US war zones, which includes Somalia. The president also unleashed a heavy bombing campaign on Yemen from mid-March until early May, which killed over 250 civilians, and failed to stop the Houthis, officially known as Ansar Allah, from launching operations against Israel in response to its genocidal war on the Gaza Strip.
